Jun 21, 2012

ONLY IN ISRAEL: SOME STORIES FROM DAILY LIFE OF A NEW IMMIGRANT

The
writer is a former Research and Teaching Fellow at Harvard University where he
received his doctorate. He served in the administrations of three U. S.
Governors, is Managing Director of a business marketing and development company
after selling his companies in America. He consults on business, education, and
community development matters. His writings frequently appear on the blog Life
in Israel, on other blogs, and publications. He will be teaching business at
the Jerusalem College of Technology this coming academic year.

I
recently provided consultation to The Partnership For A New American Economy
And The Partnership for New York City. In a report to the Mayor and corporate
executives, it recommends America adopt the best immigration practices of other
nations: NOT COMING TO AMERICA: WHY THE U.S. IS FALLING BEHIND IN THE GLOBAL
RACE FOR TALENT, May 2012 (www.pfnyc.org).

They
asked me to describe the history of our aliyah (immigration) to Israel, and
government support programs that make aliyah profluent and ultimately, we all
hope, a successful transition from America. You can read some of my thoughts
under the Personal Focus section, and on blogs like Life in Israel and Arutz
Sheva.

Israel funds a NGO whose staff addresses the
special needs of immigrants. They claim a 97% success rate for over 30,000
immigrants they have helped since 2002. Immigrants get financial support
underpinning the lifestyle change, education that bridges the social, language,
and cultural barriers, and more. Just two
recent incidents:

Immigration
is facilitated by the government-sponsored group, Nefesh B’Nefesh (One Soul at
a Time) that is responsible from beginning and for years after an immigrant’s
arrival. After three-months in Israel, we
received an email from them reminding us to apply for our temporary passport
travel document that allows us to leave the country (and return) without
interrupting our government benefits; we might have missed this on their 14-point
bucket list without the email reminder. At
five months, we got a phone call from a staff member just wanting to know how
things are going, do we need any help with anything, and giving us their hot
line number again to call.

The
call jogged me to think about events in our new lives. Boycotts, settlements, two-state
solutions—all way beyond me, not that I don’t have an opinion on all that
stuff. But following are some of the smaller events we encounter that might be of
more interest and revealing about life in Israel only in Israel:

1. My wife lost her camera—an old story. We never found
out where it was found, but a young man called on Saturday night to say he
found it.He insisted on bringing it to
us, which meant he had to take two buses.He arrived near midnight, handed me the camera, and was about to leave
for the two-bus ride back to his school when I offered him a reward.He absolutely refused. I offered to pay for a
taxi, but he insisted he has a bus pass.My wife asked how he found us? He told us he was at a loss what to do
with the camera.He paid to develop the
pictures (an old camera). Going through them, he saw one with a “welcome to
Israel” plaque on the door of a family named Langer. He searched the phone
book, and called Langers in the book asking if anyone lost a camera?My brother-in-law told him “No,” but my
sister lost one.” He got our phone number, and only in Israel, can you believe
it or not?

2. My wife, an accomplished artist, published, works on
commissions, and is now making jewelry, like when we met over forty years ago.
After a trek to the Tel Aviv bead center—yes there is a neighborhood for beads
and beading, we stopped for a kosher breakfast. We had the most delicious meal. As great as
the humus, shwarma, and the Argentine meat restaurants are, breakfasts are our
favorite. Ethel asked the young waitress for a “bencher,” a Grace After Meals
booklet of prayers recited after eating a meal with bread. Religious Israelis
and most Orthodox know this prayer by heart, but we still like to look at the
printed word. The restaurant does not have any, because people so seldom
request one.Then she says, “Rega
(wait),” runs to grab her own purse, pulls one out, and hands it to Ethel.Big tip on the way, and only in Israel,
believe it or not.

3. We rent an apartment, rather than buy for reasons not
important here.Our lease has a clause that
only appears in an Israeli document, and not many of them.It claims we have 60 days to vacate the
premises “when the Moshiach (Messiah) comes.” You think anywhere but Israel you
will see that, believe it or not.

4. Traffic jams in Israel are second to none. We do not own a car. We walk, and take public
transportation. That might change in the future. I have not ridden a bus, since I was ten
years old. In the meantime, I am down 13 pounds and two inches from my
waistline in three months from walking the hills of Bet Shemesh. We are on a
bus that comes to a halt, because a loose donkey is blocking the road. Ok, that might happen anywhere. Chicago had a panther on the loose, and once
my business neighbor and I watched a tiger walk by our stores. Our friends told
us about a bus driver stopped for traffic. A taxi driver going in the opposite direction of
the bus, shouts out if the bus driver can make change for him? The bus driver gives the money to a passenger
on the bus who runs out, exchanges it for bills the taxi driver hands him, and
scurries back to hand them to the bus driver. Horns are honking, you can
believe it or not.

5. Finally, anyone who visits or lives here knows there
are soldiers constantly travelling. I am waiting in the lounge area of a
bus/train station seated amongst kiosks. They sell food, books, jewelry, wigs,
knickknacks, make-up, and more. I watch a tough looking young soldier with a
big gun slung over her shoulder resting on her backside; ribbons and pins on
her chest; officer bars on the epaulets; heavy duty red combat boots, standing
at a kiosk trying on different shades of nail polish. I wish I had my camera
for Life Magazine. I had my camera on the train from Tel Aviv sitting across
two young female soldiers. I was reading about
the Iran nuclear threat, and how the best-prepared, most sophisticated military
is on stand-by to do whatever it takes protecting Israel from the existential
threat.I glance over, and watch these
two young women lounging in their seats texting on their pink cell phones at
break-thumb speed.Were they texting
orders to their charges, to their commanders, to their girlfriends?But these are the guardians of Israel’s fate
in whose hands we place our existential future, and I
believe it.

Israel's special forces soldiers gearing up for an attack on Iran

6. Today I dropped off some cleaning at 2 in the
afternoon. I had to wait a few minutes for the clerk to remove his
Rabbaynu Tam tefillin, before he could check in my clothes. There must be a
joke in here somewhere about ticky no washy, but I can't think of it, believe
it or not.

Daily,
it is an unforgettable journey through a Holy Land.

TTheyHE PARTNERSHIP
FOR A NEW AMERICAN ECONOMY & THE PARTNERSHIP FOR NEW Y

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About Me

I am a regular Joe with a Yeshiva background. I learned in Telshe Yeshiva, Heichal HaTorah (R' Tzvi Kushelevsky), and a now defunct Halacha Kollel. I have semicha from R' Zalman Nechemia Goldberg and kaballa in Shechita from Dayan Schwartz of Kehillas HaYeraim (Chomas HaKashrus). I have a college degree in Finance from Touro College and am also a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer.
My wife and I, with our 8 children, ben porat yosef (knayna hara), live in Eretz Yisrael.